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HomeKaunihera | CouncilDocumentsReviews and surveysResidents' opinion survey

Residents' opinion survey

It is important for the Council to know how Kāpiti residents feel about our performance and the way we deliver our many services and activities. One of the ways we do this is to undertake quarterly resident surveys – to look at what we do well, and where we need to make improvements.

We set ourselves performance targets for many of our services – both through our long term and our annual planning process. The survey results tell us how we are performing against these targets and inform our annual report each year.

We contract an independent research company, called Research First, to conduct our resident survey. They ensure it’s done correctly, using statistically representative samples of Kāpiti residents to get accurate results. Research First carries out similar surveys for other local authorities in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Key points | Surveys

Key points

The quarterly surveys are carried out in September, December, March and June of each financial year.

Each survey runs for about two weeks, or until 200 responses are collected for the quarter. This gives us an annual sample of 800 responses (sometimes slightly more), resulting in a maximum margin of error of +/-3.5 percent at the 95 percent confidence interval.

All surveys are carried out by phone, using a database of randomly generated local landline numbers or cell phone numbers gathered during previous surveys.

Researchers should be calling 4–8.30pm Monday to Friday, and 12 midday to 6pm Saturday to Sunday. They should only call after that time if a respondent arranges a callback for then.

The researchers try to match their survey respondents with the Kāpiti population demographic, so will occasionally stop the phone call politely if the respondent states their age group/gender/location and the researchers have already surveyed the ‘quota’ for that demographic.

They will introduce themselves as calling from Research First on behalf of Kāpiti Coast District Council, and will ask for the youngest person aged over 18 in the household. This is not because they’re only interested in the views of younger people but because that is the hardest group to fill the demographic quota for. When that quota is filled that initial question will change as needed. Even starting with that question many of the older age group quotas will still be filled first as many households only have older residents.

Council staff and non-Kāpiti residents are also screened for and excluded.

Annual results for each financial year are usually published around August/September of the following year. Annual results for previous years can be accessed below.

The Council contracted Research First to undertake the Residents Opinion Survey in 2016/17 and since then the survey has been conducted quarterly. Before 2016/17 there was a single annual survey undertaken each year.

Surveys